The Designed Life
Welcome to The Designed Life with Ameera Virani.
A weekly conversation for visionary women who are ready to lead with clarity, live with intention, and rise into their next chapter with both elegance and edge. This show blends soulful wisdom with strategic clarity to guide you home to your Designed Life.
Whether you're navigating leadership, motherhood, midlife reinvention, intimacy, wealth, or wellness, this space offers you belonging, elevation, and the kind of real-talk that reconnects you to who you truly are.
No noise. No perfection. Just you, being seen, held, and called higher.
The Designed Life
Your Life Is a Constellation: Identity, Transition, and the Invitation to Be More Than One Thing
Use Left/Right to seek, Home/End to jump to start or end. Hold shift to jump forward or backward.
You’ve built a life that looks right on paper, but something in you keeps whispering that it doesn’t quite fit anymore. You’re holding everyone together and wondering who’s holding you. In this conversation, Ameera sits down with Stefanie Holmden, mental health clinician, founder of Holmm, and published poet, to explore what happens when a woman starts to outgrow the identity she’s been living in.
They talk about why change feels like loss even when we chose it, what your nervous system is actually doing when it’s “on fire,” and how to tell the difference between tired and in survival mode.Stefanie shares her framework of pause, ponder, proceed for navigating transition without burning everything down. They explore the power of diversifying your identity, creating an alignment avatar for boundary-setting and why your life was never meant to be a single star but a whole constellation.
HIGHLIGHTS
Before the Clinician: Who Were You? Stephanie’s origin story - journalism, a career pivot at 30 with a newborn, and the mother who saw what she couldn’t.
Why Does Change Feel Like Loss? Identity conditioning, the desire for certainty, and why we stop diversifying who we are in adulthood.
Coming Home to Yourself. Calming the nervous system as a prerequisite for alignment, and the pause, ponder, proceed framework.
When Your Nervous System Is on Fire. The F modes (fight, flight, freeze, fawn), recognising dysregulation in high-functioning women, and the first step toward awareness.
Boundaries and the Alignment Avatar. A creative approach to setting boundaries: define your values, build an avatar, and let her lead.
When the People Around You Don’t Recognise You Anymore. Navigating identity change in relationships, the caring community, and why belonging has to grow with you.
Where Did I Go? A Message to Mothers. Guilt, the emotional calendar, and asking your children the question that changes everything.
Holmm and the Belief in Inherent Wisdom. Why Stephanie starts from “you already know” and what happens when people tap into their intuitive self.
Connect With Stefanie Holmden
Email: stefanie@holmm.ca
Connect With Ameera
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New Intro Feb 2026
Disclaimer
The Designed Life with Ameera Virani and all associated content is intended for general informational, educational, and inspirational purposes only. The insights shared on this podcast, as well as any linked resources or materials, are not a substitute for professional advice, diagnosis, or treatment. This podcast is not intended to replace the guidance of a licensed therapist, medical professional, financial advisor, or other qualified professionals. Always seek the advice of your personal support team.
Hi, welcome back to the design life. I am Amira, your host. And I want to start today by talking to you, the woman listening right now, maybe you're on your commute, maybe your kids are finally asleep, and this is the only quiet you'll get today, or maybe you're on a walk because you needed to breathe. But wherever you are, I want you to know this conversation was made for this exact moment in your life. Because if you've been feeling like the life that you have built doesn't quite fit anymore, or if you've been holding everyone together while wondering who's holding you, today's guest is going to change the way you think about what's happening inside of you. And I don't say that lightly. Stephanie Holmden is a mental health clinician. She's the founder of Home, a published poet and mother. And today she's going to help us understand something that most of us have been feeling, but maybe have never had the words for. So, Stephanie, welcome to the show. Welcome to the design life. I'm so thrilled to have you here. And I would love to start off with asking before you became a clinician, before Cambridge, before the creation of home, who were you? What kind of girl were you growing up?
SPEAKER_00I think I was a very different person in my youth than I am now. If I were to reflect, I would say that I was someone who likely can have had a very linear mindset, right? Being able to, you know, go to school. The messages, you know, I think from parents and society was the next step is to go to university, and the next step and so on and so forth. And then things changed. So I started in journalism because I thought that was just like really interesting. And writing was a passion. And then soon found out that that wasn't going to be my career, and actually went back to school to do my master's in social work quite late in life. I think what people would consider, I think I was 30 or so and went back and said, you know, I need a change of career. Like this isn't something at that point. I was more doing kind of administrative kind of pieces, a little bit kind of within politics. And it just wasn't for me, right? I wasn't feeling aligned anymore. And then when I did find therapy, the pieces just fell together, right? And I look back and it was that moment where I rejected what people were saying that this was maybe not the place to go back to school to transition into another identity. I had just had my first child. And it was the messages that I received were this is your time to settle and to do the things, do the job, have the child, whatever it might be. And then, you know, after that, I after I think that rejection and when I did go back to school, I just found that those were my people. This was my career. This was something that was going to intrigue me for a lifetime. Yeah. Really match my values. And I think I've discovered that more and more throughout my career. And also kind of be able to use my creativity throughout. And I found out that people and supporting people and being able to lead them, guide them, whatever that looks like, towards their authentic self was just a complete passion. Well, yeah.
SPEAKER_01And I'm curious to know, like you mentioned this point where you realized, you know, this is not the path I want to follow. This is not the degree I want to pursue. Was there, was there an experience, like a specific moment where that became clear to you? Or was it more just a calling to explore a different area? And then you found out, you found through experimentation or discovery what you were passionate about? Because I I asked this question because I think a lot of women have a passion or an interest or they have a dream perhaps, but they're not quite sure if it's a path worth pursuing or how to identify the moment that's really calling them into a new path. So was did you feel that naturally, or was it more just I'm curious about this and I'm gonna go explore?
SPEAKER_00I would say it was it was a combination of everything you just said. I think it was a little bit at the beginning before I found this career path a little bit darker in sure, let's say, in that I was just kind of feeling this sense of loss or stuckness of sorts and not really understanding why, right? And so having to kind of enter that place of questioning, you know, I think of my own identity, what that might look like. And it was actually my mother, who's just such a lovely human, who suggested to saying, like, you know, you've experienced people within the therapeutic world. This is where you could go, this is what we could do. And she was actually a strong supporter of me going back to do my masters. Yeah, incredible. Right. It I think it's it was also a change moment, I think, also for our relationship of like both me becoming a new mother and how I sort of nurturing never stops.
SPEAKER_01I I'm so happy that you shared that because oftentimes our parents can be the ones who sort of encourage us to stay on that normal, safe course of action, stick to the plan. The plan is good. And growing up myself in a family, you know, with who were immigrants to this country, there was that deep desire for safety, for safety of path, for safety of like the education you'll pursue, the degree you'll get, the job you'll you'll, you know, work for the rest of your life until you get a pension. And so to have a parent see you and support you in the shift is really is beautiful and compelling. And I share that because I know a lot of us are parents and we have our own beliefs. So we have our own conditioning that we sometimes knowingly or unknowingly are passing on to our children. So I feel like this is just a great reminder to always be open and to let our children teach us who they are throughout their life as well and to really honor them for that.
SPEAKER_00So thank you for sharing that. Of course. And and agreed on that point, right? I think in my clinical work, what I see most often is desire to have certainty, even if that certainty is not serving us, right? Which is, and I don't know if we all realize that even if it's not serving us, it's still familiar. And psychologically, we desire to be in a familiar state. And so moving into this transitional space, I've been really intrigued on how we do that as humans, how uncomfortable it is, and being on that threshold of difference and feel unfamiliar at the beginning, but when we take one step towards and not see it as this like ultimate goal of having to be at our vision tomorrow, and actually enjoy that space. Like often I'll tell I'll explain it to my clients in this way of you know, we can we can envision change and transition as being on an airplane, right? Like we get on the airplane and we're at our destination. Sure, that's one way we can do it, and we can see out the window and we can appreciate some points of like growth or inspiration, whatever that looks like. Or we can see it as a train, that we get on a train and we can see the landscape, we can have a moment of maybe connection with other people and also get to our destination. But within that journey, we actually see many parts of ourselves and then further ground in those values to make that destination more sustainable.
SPEAKER_01Wow, that's such a beautiful way to frame it. Like I can actually follow that journey. And to your point earlier, like we we are very much searching safety and certainty. That's just sort of our inherent human nature. And I know with your work, like you really work with people at the intersection of trauma and relationships and developing their own personal meaning. So when you talk again, with going back to the work you do with your clients, especially during those periods of transition, what I'd love to understand is why does change feel sometimes, I think the word that comes to mind is loss. Like it feels like you're maybe you're I know some people use the word release, but I feel like there's almost a feeling of loss, even if it's something we choose, like even if it's we're working towards something we're envisioning and that we deeply desire, why does the thing we want most sometimes terrify us? I would answer that in a few different ways.
SPEAKER_00The first one I think we need to acknowledge is that we do have a certain amount of conditioning and social narratives that exist. And one of those, one of the groupings of messages is that if we change, if we change our identity, if we move whatever it happens to be that has uncertainty within it, certainty has been framed as dangerous, change has been framed as dangerous, and status quo has often been noted as being like the ideal, right? We prioritize it. And we may not prioritize it if we speak to someone. We may have different external ways that we would express or articulate that we are okay with transition, we are okay with change. However, their clients will often explain it like there's there's just something within them, right? Like something within their stomach, that nervousness type feeling. And when we discuss it, it then goes into identity. We've also been given the message that identity and changing of one's identity is actually not the end goal, right? That that we are to be working to define a particular identity versus that viewpoint of could we have diverse identities? Could we know that we could transform into holding a different identity? Because when we look at our lives, we do it often. And then I find people get stuck around like adulthood. So as we are a child, we transition to a teen, to a young adult. Maybe we're going to be a parent, maybe we're going to kind of have a particular job, maybe we're going to be an aunt or an uncle. And so we have a little bit more diversity at some points in our life. And then I find that there's this desire for us to kind of develop one. And the difficulty with that is that if we have 90% of one identity identity, and I do find this when we look at people who have careers in which they have to actually dedicate a lot of effort, right? So if we look at somebody who is a teacher, 80% of their day is being a teacher and that's their identity. However, when that goes away and there's no diversification, then we have this deep sense of loss, right? Of what that might look like. And so to me, that's kind of part of that grief of if we're changing one, a familiar state for most humans is certainty and not necessarily seeing that transition as the train, as we just talked about. So that creates a discomfort. The other part is around we're not used to diversifying our identity. However, when we look at something like finances, that's the recommended, right? Like there's these interesting messages where in one area of our life we're like diversify your finances, whatever that might look like. In other areas of our life, we're told, no, this needs to be singular. And singular is the ultimate goal of where we want you to be so that you can excel and be seen as an expert. And it actually took me a long time to be able to conceptualize myself. Like I would say a long time in that it was clearly adulthood to conceptualize myself in more than one way and that that would be okay. So at the beginning, you were like, she's a poet, a mother, a clinician. I'm somewhat putting entrepreneurial kind of spirit in there, I can't identify with that yet, but we're working on it. And seeing that as something that is beneficial, right? Really to my clients, that if I'm able to see the world in a diverse way that has different elements, and that I can put my different interests within my work or value creativity, imagination, looking at, you know, whether it happens to be like philosophy, mathematics, finance, like I might not be an expert in any of those different areas. However, I can be a diverse and full human and that that's a value as well. And I find that's quite an interesting message that I actually had to unwind. And then when I did look back, I'm like, oh, okay, that was that was a narrative that was threaded through my life until there was this recognition and awareness that it actually wasn't serving me. And it was more so denying aspects of myself that are really important and contribute to like an amazing sense of alignment and joy.
SPEAKER_01Yeah. Wow. I I think so many women hearing this just probably exhaled because sometimes we think that us desiring something different or wanting to walk a different path or even explore a new version of ourselves or new identity, as you say, it means there's something wrong with us, right? That why aren't we satisfied or content, or why can't we just be peaceful with what we have? And so I appreciate you sharing that context that it's quite natural for us to explore these diverse identities, to explore the different facets of ourselves. So when I think about like the pain of transitioning from one identity to the next, or even just being willing to release what we feel is no longer aligned, would you say that that transition is like, is that a new, is that me searching for something new, or is that something, or am I simply uncovering something that was already there? Because I sometimes frame it, you know, when I talk to my clients sometimes, I say sometimes there's there's inherent things that we are passionate about or that we're really gifted at. And sometimes it almost feels like a coming home when you finally allow yourself to express that identity. So like, how do you view that? Is it is it always new and exciting and you're moving towards something new, or is it actually like you're returning to to yourself in some way?
SPEAKER_00I think that that's such an intriguing question. And what I found with folks is that when you talk kind of about a coming home, I think that's a there's a beautiful way to frame it. However, we don't always know what that feels like to come home. Right. So whether our life hasn't like informed that or we haven't necessarily experienced it, I think coming home to me has two different pieces that we actually discussed before. But like one of it is actually knowing what a calm nervous system might feel like. Right. And so in order to transition to a place of looking at alignment, moving towards a sense of maybe something that is more value-driven, we also have to know, right? And that our nervous system, if it's never been calm, if it's never had a place of exploration, if we've never been able to be in a place where we're not in a place, where we're not confronting, where we're not escaping, where we're not appeasing, when we're not kind of moving into that perfectionist high standard state, then we first have to learn how to calm in order to feel that sensation of what would a value feel like, whatever value it is, whether it's comfort, whether it's playfulness, whether it's groundedness, all of those pieces so that we can actually then get a different part of our mind and our psyche into place, right? If not, we're in this place of danger mode. So transitions, danger mode, right? Defining your identity in a different way, danger mode. Something that's really worked with my clients is we, it's it's a lovely term, I think, but pause, ponder, and proceed. So for the pause, it's like, how do we calm our nervous system in a way that we can then go into a place of like pondering and exploration? So whether that's somebody just taking a pause from a room, right? Maybe it's kind of within the moment, maybe it's something where we're taking a pause and kind of using that, I'll respond in 24 hours. Like more of what we would say is like just draft that email and like step back and see how it is. That might look like being able to, I think, normalize pause within our society, I think would be a really interesting movement to another space. So that we can say, actually, thank you for bringing that information to me. Thank you for bringing that experience to me. I will just be pausing for a moment so that I can take it in and I can move in a direction, potentially, or whatever direction it might be. For that pondering piece, I think this gets back to what you were talking about, like a sense of home, a sense of what that might feel like to transition to a different identity. And that would be, you know, like what is activating, what is causing grief? What is what is a sense of loss and being really curious about what is happening before we perceive? What values do I have? Which I think is value definition, is a fascinating conversation. And do we need to ask for support, right? Like who might help? Do we need extra information? And so, like, that's the ponder is like really about cultivating creativity within our whole lives and cultivating curiosity and then proceeding. Really important part that I share with my clients is then kind of having this like reflexivity of how did that go without judgment, with deep self-compassion. How did we experience that? And also knowing that this process isn't something that will feel familiar, immediate, and that it might feel quite mechanical, but to believe that every time we do it, we are rewiring how we might move through the world and actually grounding it in if I would like to make decisions that are value-driven, if I would like to make decisions that are maybe questioning past narratives or social norms, then first let me ground myself. We use that terminology really quite frequently and we don't always kind of share openly, right? Within conversations, like, what does that mean? It means like we need to move our nervous system into a place where like a different part of our mind and our brain is actually then firing versus reacting.
SPEAKER_01So I would love to break this down a little bit more in something that feels like a real life experience for a woman right now who's listening. So for the woman who's always on or feels like she's always on, so she's managing maybe the house, the career, the relationship, all the school emails, you know, always keeping a sense of what the emotional temperature of everyone else is around her. So she's see she's very high functioning and maybe doesn't realize there's some dysregulation there around her nervous system. Can you walk us through what she would be feeling? What would be some of the symptoms of that dysregulation?
SPEAKER_00Sure. I like to call it like when our nervous system is on fire, right? Like what does what does that peace feel like? And I think some of the words, like when we say, I want to confront, if we have that desire to confront someone, we may want to just like step back and be curious about that. If we have that desire or that trend in our life of appeasing, we may want to stem talk. If we are feeling like we can't even interact and are in like very much like that freeze state of I don't even know what to say right now, or desire to completely escape the situation. So maybe that's avoiding everything, those school emails, whatever that might be, or that urge to confront people, or the actual action of confronting people, even if they're not part of the situation that that might have activated us. I think looking at those pieces is really important. You know, it's it's a funny term that one of my children came back with one day from elementary school and they taught it as the F mode. And like gone into the F mode. Oh, closing choice, tell me more. And they were really speaking about fight, flight, freeze, and fawning, which is really the, I think the new one that people don't always know, which is the appeasing or submitting to something where that doesn't necessarily feel aligned. One of the big ones is being able to say no, right? That that's actually quite difficult, tend to appease other people. So we're kind of in a fawn state because it doesn't feel like we want to say no, like saying no or I don't have the capacity to do that right now, feels odd and misaligned, but also that pressure in order to proceed in that way. And I think tuning into behavior sometimes is a little bit easier than emotions. Then kind of taking it to the next step of like, what did I go into an F mode and what does that look like? And joining that to do those experiences then compound to my nervous system, then feeling on fire. So feeling on fire is not just activation, but also just feeling exhausted. So am I constantly feeling incredibly exhausted? Can I look at what that looks like? If I'm afraid to set a boundary, or if I'm hesitant to set a boundary or feels very uncomfortable to set a boundary, am I then in F mode, which is a clear indication of your nervous system is on fire in some way?
SPEAKER_01If you're feeling the need to confront someone, or if you're feeling the need to disassociate or run away from it or appease someone, like those are all indications that your nervous system is fire, as you put it. I think of a situation for me personally where if I, you know, I was at a place in my life and career where I was nearing, I was just overexhausted. I thought it was just exhaustion, that I was just tired from doing everything. Everything. And there came a point where I actually got very ill and then I hit this place of burnout where I just had to take, like literally remove myself from my work environment and take a pause and deal with my health. And so part of the work I do now, like I'm so committed to it, is because I don't want women to get to that place where they just push themselves to that brink of, you know, burnout, exhaustion, illness, and to understand what's happening in their bodies, in their minds, in their nervous system, so that all along the way they can be listening and tuning in and then know what to do. Because it's one thing to go, okay, well, yeah, I'm I'm there. I'm I'm on, you know, I'm probably gonna burn myself out, but to really understand what does that mean? What does that feel like, how to identify it as symptoms in your nervous system or your body, and then what you can do about it. So I appreciate you sharing all, you know, that reference or that picture. If a woman is going through that right now and she's listening to this and she's going, like, I can almost, I can almost say to her, like, if you just felt your shoulders drop and you're like, oh wow, this is me, like I can hear it. This is this is what I'm in right now, how would she know the difference between I'm just stressed or I am just tired? I need, you know, I need to just take a break and rest, or my nervous system is in nervous survival mode and this is high risk. I need to really address this. What would she do at each level? Like, what would you recommend to a client who comes to you at any one of those stages in terms of how she what she could do right now in this moment to begin to come back to sort of a more regulated state? Okay, that was a good question. Yeah. Sorry. I was I didn't articulate that way, that as clearly as I'd hoped it would come out. But I think there it is.
SPEAKER_00All right, I think every client is different. So if I were broadly speaking about kind of the information that's it sounds very boring, but the first step we need to do is just general awareness. Okay. And what I mean by that is being able to identify when you have moments of calm. So for example, if someone you had a lot on your plates and you were doing all of the things all day and you're feeling a sense of exhaustion, and someone canceled a meet and you went, Thank goodness I have a moment to breathe, right? Or when you maybe were ill and feeling a sense of guilt, and someone gave you compassion and said, actually, it's okay. We can reorient all of those pieces. That's an indication. Also, if your body's like, oh, thank goodness, like, thank goodness that's stopped. Like, one, that's an indication of close to Burno. Two, it's the sign of like tuning in to what did your body feel like in that moment? Like, did your shoulders drop, as you said? Did you have an exhale? What does that look like in your body? When you're having a moment away where you're able to read a book, go for a walk, go for a run, whatever that happens to be, what does that feel like for you? Because in those states, your nervous system is calm or has been voluntarily calm, right? In that moment. And so when we pay attention to what it feels like to be in a calmer state, then we're gonna know when we moved out. What we want to do is take the familiar, which is a nervous system on fire, typically for many women I know, and move it to a calmer state. One's familiar, one's unfamiliar. So we're to move to that place. We also have to start noticing being and cultivating more of those moments. Because it doesn't mean we're not doing anything. It means that we're taking it at a pace that will allow us to actually sustain something and to sustain whatever that goal might be. To layer on, I also talk to people a lot about wobble points when it comes to boundaries. Because what I'm kind of hearing in some of the questions is like, we do need to set boundaries. We also need to be aware of what boundaries have been crossed. So is it emotional? Is it time boundaries? What are those wobble points where we feel like we can't say no, that we go into maybe one of these mod pieces? Because once we know that, it's much easier to take a step towards defining your values and then walking with those values more consistently than not.
SPEAKER_01So I'd love to pull the thread a little bit on the word boundaries because I'm well, I think I'm better at them now. Have not always been great at setting boundaries. How would you recommend a woman who is, again, very high functioning, ambitious, and is looking to design like her a really fulfilling, beautiful life, and she knows she can't keep taking more on and she can't keep functioning at the level she's at. Maybe she can, but she doesn't want to. That's not what she desires anymore. What kind of advice do you give her on how to set a boundary? So I've I've tended to go quite creative on this one.
SPEAKER_00Okay. Because in the past, when I've I've given clients, maybe like a worksheet or web that might be around like, you know, where are your wobble points when it comes to boundaries? People can identify them, right? When they can do that step, often it's the next step of activating those boundaries or setting those boundaries, whatever technology you might use, which is the difficult market. And I've actually landed on combining two different their team modalities and some creative pieces there around creating like an alignment avatar. So at times people might find themselves kind of surveying other people, like external validation or being able to ask other people what to do. And we can ground that in boundaries right now, right? Like what should I do? How do I set it? And we're in this like often like confused state. And so if we're going to set boundaries, which I think is incredibly important, it also means we have to define what our values and what's important to us. Because once we know that, we're going to be able to look at the constellation of whatever's on our plate and then set appropriate boundaries, whatever that may, if we're kind of thinking of like more of a point of vision for your life, right? And how this tends to work, and I would be really curious if the listeners would like do this as we're talking around capturing their values or what's important to them, and then seeing if they do struggle to put those into action, and if then boundaries are very hard to maintain or set. And so the first thing is being able to say, okay, where do I tend to lean towards? Do I go logic? Do I go into my place of past narratives, social norms, whatever that might be? Or do I go into a place of maybe emotional? I'm doing it because I feel like I have to. I'm doing because it's an obligation or it's expected of me or whatever that might be. And then being able to say, okay, let me sit with my values. And this will take a process. So I tell people, I'm like, let's do it when you're in a calm state, not like in the moment first. And being able to determine what your values are, and then actually creating an ally kind of figure or an avatar to help you alone. So this is how it works in practice. I've had clients define what their values are. So are your values family? Are your values moving towards your vision, whatever that might look like? Are your values learning, creativity, curiosity, whatever that might be? And when they have their five, we sit down and we say, okay, like one, let's test these a little bit. So just out in the world, let's test, move towards creativity versus something where maybe it's more work-oriented. Have a moment where you're just scribbling on a piece of paper. How did that feel versus moving into something that was familiar? Because we're moving into the unfamiliar. And then creating kind of this avatar with all of those values. So for example, one of my clients created kind of like a ranch woman so that there was assertiveness, so that there were boundaries, so that there was still adventure in there. And that allowed them to actually set more boundaries in life so that it wasn't I have to do everything, but I'm going to do these things that maybe fit into adventure more often than not. I'm going to know that I can't do everything on the ranch all the time, but I'm going to set a schedule and I'm going to maintain that schedule and I'm going to articulate what that looks like. And I'm going to have a sense of confidence because that's also what is embedded within my appetite. And when people do that, it creates a really fascinating outcome because it seems too creative. It seems too far out there. But it does help you develop that autonomy when it comes to decision making and battery making. Because we can sit with ourselves and say, okay, like what would a ranch woman do right now? Another client gave like a majestic mayor, right? So a mayor kind of organizes everything, but within it is still fun and playfulness and whatever that might be and alignment and curiosity. How do I bring that out into the world? And when I walk with that particular avatar, it is surprising how easy it is to start to set specific boundaries that just feel whether we want to be use aligned or grounded. It just takes out that nervousness that way. It's like this big, I think, concept, but it has creativity. And you know, I wonder if listeners like re-listen to that part, like what they would create. Yes. Or at times having friends create and see your strengths and reflect those back to you, we have been lost throughout the way or things that we don't always reflect on. But I think awareness and being willing to be slow in the process of alignment is a gift to us and sustaining a state that we want to be in.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, I think I love the way you've re well, for me anyway, that was a complete reframe on how we often think of a boundary. It felt a lot more, to your point, creative, playful. It allows you to have your own sense of self-expression. So it's not this hard, rigid thing that feels really uncomfortable, where it's more just you exploring what that boundary looks like for you. And again, very much in alignment with your values, what truly speaks to what who you prioritize, what you prioritize, what you believe in. So yeah, thank you. I never would have thought of it that way. So I appreciate, I'm glad I asked that question. So I want to change directions a little bit because you have such an incredible and diverse background in terms of your personal, professional, and academic experience. And I'd love to chat a little bit about something you studied at Cambridge that I think was quite fascinating. And I think it's it's going to be a real revelation for the women listening. You focused on moral strain and moral injury. And I don't know that a lot of people have heard that term. And I think you said you believe that women, everyday women are carrying it. So can you tell us what that is? How would we identify that?
SPEAKER_00One of the pieces that I studied was how that presented within the healthcare uh community, whether mental health or whether when we look at hospitals, okay, specifically during the pandemic. So, like from an origin story, this is this is how I looked at it. And it really was about how healthcare workers at that time were feeling as though their ethics, their morals, their values, what's important to them, was put into question and that they sometimes had to move forward with actions, making decisions that were against their values, like whether we encapsulate that as ethics and morals. So if they didn't have enough support from leadership, if they felt like leadership was maybe making decisions that weren't aligned with their medical ethics, whether they didn't have enough supplies during the pandemic era to be able to support people in the way that they would, if they had many of those things. So what ended up happening was really around the sense of like betrayal of I my voice wasn't heard, I wasn't seen, my skill set might not have been valued, and being able to make actions that they would deem to be the best possible standard was not always possible. And the the impact of that was that many people left the healthcare environment because of that sense of betrayal, because they felt as though they maybe did something or could not have could not do something that was against their core values and world's values. I think the important part of this and what I learned from a larger mainstream perspective is that when we have experiences like that, so they don't necessarily have to be within the healthcare. It really is about like not being seen, not being heard as we titrate it down to kind of um similar kind of basic concepts, feeling as though you're being overused, that there's that moral strain. So it might not be as high as moral distress or moral injury because it's a spectrum. However, if we're looking at moral strain, it's like the being asked to do things constantly that are impeding on our life that feel as though we're not being seen, heard, valued. And I see that moral strain part in in positions that are very fast-paced, have kind of a higher chance of burnout. And overall, when we continue to have those, let's say we have a 10-year career, we get to a place of burnout. I also see a very interesting piece happening where there's this like residual shadow effect of it. So whether people go into a different career path, sometimes there's still that shadow aspect of like, will this happen again? Or a sensitivity towards maybe not being seen as their skill sets being seen, their strengths being seen, those being valued. And that's something that tends to also compile. That's probably a very short response to this question, but it does, it does really moral strain impacts so many different parts of ourselves and how we're able to manage other attentions in our lives and be able to not feel as though our nervous system died.
SPEAKER_01You know, Stephanie, hearing you describe that, I think I actually carried that. I've carried that before in previous roles, and I never had a name for it. But I imagine a lot of women listening just realized the same thing. So thank you for sharing that. And I and I agree with you. I immediately think of this, you know, recent report that I read where it says women are leaving the corporate world in record numbers and going off to start their own businesses. Do you think that maybe a catalyst for them?
SPEAKER_00It could play a part, right? I I do love when we put it on a spectrum, right? Because not everything is moral injury. I would say that's most severe. Not everything is moral dispersed. Moral strain, I kind of see more often and in that like repetitive, um, high cost, high time, exactly what you're describing, right? I see it also as people valuing something different. And I see it translating into the business world a little bit around looking at emotional intelligence, looking at adaptability and flexibility, looking at being able to speak just different language versus something that I think was very much prominent in the business world when it was more mechanical, right? Like we do, do do do, push, push, push. And like that's the standard. And I think that's switching. Like I think we're seeing more in ways in which people are creating businesses. I think there's more creativity in around how one would monetize skill sets that feel innate. So whether in in the world that you're in for like coaching and leading and guiding and allowing people to see that they could express themselves in another way, feel the sense of going. I also think that's the other part of it.
SPEAKER_01I appreciate the different viewpoints that you offer there. I think one of the loneliest experiences that a woman can have is starting to change, starting to say, I want to explore a new path, and then realizing that the people around her don't necessarily support. Have you seen that in your practice? And how do you advise a woman who's going through that? Again.
SPEAKER_00And I think that I might bring it to kind of a more personal focus, right? Yeah, what that would look like. I do see that with my clients as well. I think it really goes back to what we were talking about more at the beginning, which is like navigating transition and the threshold of what that looks like. And with identity change, I think comes also whether we like it or not, we may have to kind of contend with the fact that some people in our lives really matched our identity at one point. Then now cultivating another caring community or community of inspiration, that almost has to go hand in hand. I think, like more from like if I were to take it both clinically and from like more of a personal perspective, I think it's it is very difficult to change, change one's identity and diversify that and to cultivate something that they they may want to do without also saying I may need also a complimentary community. And so I call it kind of like my caring community. And I think post-divorce, I kind of had to say, okay, what does that look like for me? You know, now as a single parent, what does a caring community look like, not only from my identity as a mother, but also my identity as a clinician, what has to change there, and then my identity as just a creative human. And so being able to, I think, cultivate those phases, potentially like manage some loss of feelings of grief of like, I wish I could hold on to all of that. And also knowing there's there is another side, right? There's another side where all of these different communities can both be separated together because they're together within you, even though they might be and to and I think that recognition and to know that some pieces, some people may leave or may not be aligned. And we may have to kind of contend with how do we manage those relationships and what does that look like? And was it a 70% effort relationship at one time because our identity matched that? Does that shift to 30%? And maybe that person's still very important or the organization is still really important, but in a different direction. Almost give our ourselves permission to say that's okay. Like it's not a this or that, like the combination. And sometimes when we put it on this, this kind of like percentile, if we're not moving 100% into all these spaces, like we're giving some time or where maybe more time is given at one point, one season. Yeah. I think that's a really run piece to know that identity and community are not separate and hasn't changed. We then look for like how do we support support this change and support this transition, and often, you know, finding other points of yeah.
SPEAKER_01I I think you're, you know, that is a very, very important point, especially for women. Building community is where you can find a lot of sense of, you know, that that support that you need as you're venturing into something new for yourself, or you're just in that exploratory phase where not everyone's going to rise to meet you where you are, and that's okay. Right. And sometimes there are people for certain seasons in your life or certain parts of your life. And then there's other groups or communities or friendships that show up for you to honor the other aspect or this new aspect of you that you're that you're discovering. So I think that's beautiful. I think I've always felt that community is really important to cultivate. So thank you for sharing that. Now I know you're also you're a mom yourself, and a lot of our listeners are moms. We're we're all moms who love our children fiercely. I have at times experienced this myself, but I know with certain people that I've worked with as well, you know, they do love their families fiercely. They do want to be there for their kids, but somewhere along the way, they may feel lost. Like they're wondering, like, where did I go? Where do I fit into my own life? And feelings of guilt can surface around wanting something more, wanting something that's just yours, right? And a little bit alluding to that idea of like another community, maybe a sense of belonging in another group, or even exploring a new career. I know for me, when I started this business, there were a lot of feelings of guilt around leaving that sort of steady corporate piece and venturing into something that's a little unknown and could shake things up a little bit in our world at home. So, what do you say to her, the woman who's like wondering where she went in her life? How does she, how does she get back to herself?
SPEAKER_00Okay. So there There's a few things I heard there. And I there's one piece that I would like to pull out first because I think guilt. I think like guilt is huge for transition and parenting. And something at the beginning I had to kind of contend with because moving towards like a single parent model, I wanted to do it all. Like I wanted to do all. And then I was like, that's fueled by guilt and both kind of working in more acute care and having a private practice. And like, how do I balance all of this? And one of the things, like my children are a little bit older, but one of the things I landed on was asking the question in this moment in time, can I support your joy? Do you need me to support your? Do you need me to support guidance, whatever that happens to be? So whether that's homework, whether that's if they they want to have a playful activity, whatever that happens to be. And I was actually shocked that sometimes my children were like, no, I'm okay. Like, no, I want to read a book, or no, I want to draw by myself, or no, I actually want to have this homework experience to test my confidence and ability. And just asking that question, I was surprised how much guilt had actually relieved while I was making those various transitions. The other piece was really being, and I guess this is definitely age-dependent, but being open. And, you know, I think we talk a lot about the family calendar, but I put emotionality into the town. Tell me more about that. Which is like when we look at it, like there's things we have to do. So someone plays soccer, someone is rugby, whatever. I then also put that I have private practice days. And so, like often I'm trying to balance that schedule so that they're with their father and then that makes sense. And that's that's the easy fix. But at times, because of wanting to be in other spaces and follow other values, like going to skate or whatever it happens to be, that I might have to reorient. And so when we look at the calendar, that I'll be like, you know, I have private practice on this day, I have a client on this day. Do we need to do something after as a family, very specifically and in a very conscious way and intentional way, so that we can feel connected and what that look like? I also take the temperature of connection or joy or adventure. And as we've grown as a unit, we are really starting to define both our individual values, because they're like lovely independent humans, and also the culture within our family. And I think part of that stemmed from guilds. But then I then I was like, okay, well, it can't stay in Gilbs. So, like, how do we translate this to ideas? And being able to look at a family calendar like that. So it's not just the doing, but it's also the being. And it's also the curiosity of like who needs what when. And so if somebody needs a little bit more, then you know, my my hope and my goal is to create an environment where someone can say, actually, I need more this week, or I'm needing this, or could you help me with some options because I'm feeling maybe just like a little bit lower? Cause sometimes life is stressful. And using that as a way to facilitate adventure, joy, you know, putting activities on there that we're all going to do together, but then also putting things where, like, okay, how do I compensate a little bit for this without burning everybody out?
SPEAKER_01Yeah, that's so important. I love, I love that putting emotionality into your calendar. I never thought of that. Just really being intentional about not just the doing, but the being as an individual, but as a family as well. And that way you are serving the whole family ecosystem and yourself in it. So that's that's beautiful. One of the things I read about you, which surprised me but and also delighted me, was to hear that you are a published poet. And I wonder if that surprises people when they hear mental health clinician. Why have you chosen on keeping that creative and clinical side of you together or exploring both of those sides and how has it served you?
SPEAKER_00Oh, yes, this is fun. This is my topic. For a long time, I didn't write. For a long time, I uh I think in my youth that there was more exploration around like creativity and and writing. And then I had this moment where I'm like, I can be like a whole bunch of different things, right? And that they can complement all of the work that I'm doing. Right. When I'm working with clients, it's creative. When we talk about trauma, there's often poetic statements resonate with clients or ways that we can construct life and just be really creative with it. And also I go into submitting poetry in this way where it's okay if I don't get published again in my life, right? Or if I, or whatever that might look like, because that's part of my identity. It's not all. And it's a part that's really fulfilling. And it's quite fulfilling to have a publication say, write a poem about this. I was like, cool, let me write up to be in a different part of my mind and to, for me, it's like that brain. So whether it's poetry, whether it's, you know, even painting with my youngest, whatever that might look like, it's going into it, not saying I have to be everything and I have to only a poet or only a writer or have like 10 publications or whatever that might be, but saying I'm going to go in for the sake of experiencing something that feels really aligned with me. I attempt, and this did take some time to cultivate. So I want to say that to all of the listeners, that I attempt to go through life as like a little explorer. I mean, like now I have you know financial stability in which to do that. And there are some just basic like things that will make everyone feel safe. And and now that I've been how can I just have a sense of playfulness and the doing without expectation? So whether it is writing a poem with something, whether it is a painting and putting it somewhere in the community, right? Like whatever it happens to be, the the act of doing, I think has been become really free because there's there's no expectation for any one of those pieces. Right. So then, you know, joining you on the podcast today, I'm like, this sounds really fun. It sounds very interesting to speak to somebody who I feel is is aligned in in a career way that we could have a very diverse conversation and create a conversation. Like that sounds really enjoyable. And so moving towards that versus saying to myself, oh my goodness, this is going to be so stressful. The what if statements of worry? And so I think that's how poetry came about. I was like, oh, I'm just gonna try this.
SPEAKER_01And see how I love that. You're an explorer in your life. I I absolutely love that. I'm going to, I'm going to remember that one. I I also love the return to just play and creativity because I think we've just become so much a society of like metrics and monetizing everything and everything. Yes, I believe in intentionality, but I also think life is not always supposed to be so serious. And we need to remember how to play. And our our children know how to do that. We we were, you know, when we're born, we're young, we play. We find joy in the smallest of things, like eating dirt. I don't know, like not suggesting anyone go out and eat dirt, but but just, you know, it's just again that playfulness. So I really appreciate you sharing that no matter what age, you can return and explore that side of yourself.
SPEAKER_00So thank you. You know, and I think on that point, you know, around creativity as well. And I love that you noted children because the way they go through life with this sense of curiosity, and they are the little explorers of life. And we forget that connection and love and caring and curiosity and creativity actually wires their brain. Really, that's how we grow up. And somewhere along the way, the you know, social norms and messages kind of stay together. However, I think we often forget that imagination and creativity also help rewire. So the benefits of participating in creative acts are small, right? That it it could be, you know, drawing or playing or gardening, whatever it happens to be, actually helps rewire our mind and also reset our nervous system. Right. Like the benefits and the knowledge building that creative acts has allowed me to have access to, I think is something that was deeply unexpected. And now I can am able to put that into my value set, but also make decisions that are aligned.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, I imagine that just makes you a better mom, therapist, coach, all of those things as well. I mean to experience a different version of you, like a more, I guess, rounded, well-rounded version of you.
SPEAKER_00I think so. And I also feel like it's I don't know where I do feel like it is also one of those pieces that has allowed me to have a little bit more psychological flexibility as well around what life could look like, receiving feedback on on what's happening at times. If I'm moving away from poetry or writing or artistic acts, then we'll my caring community is sometimes like, so that made you feel good. So why are we now moving away from it? And there's that like sense of accountability, yeah, when we're also able to, but yes, poetry has been a beautiful outlet for many things.
SPEAKER_01Wonderful. Wonderful. It's another very dynamic aspect of who you are. Can you share a little bit about home? Because it's built on something that I find is really deeply interesting and innovative around this belief that people that we have inherent wisdom and where most messaging is saying, you know, you need this to feel that, or come by this thing, or experience this, and I'll fix you. You start from a very different place. Why is that?
SPEAKER_00I think that over time, you know, I have worked with more structured kind of therapies, right? Where it is a little bit more specific with agenda and protocol and then other therapies that are a little bit more fluid. And really, I think that when given time and space and you know, a little bit of a format, people will come to who they are, maybe who they forgot they were, maybe who they desire to be. And I actually have found, and I love that values and value driven is much more mainstream now, because often all grounded there. Even if the vision isn't tomorrow, intuitively right now, what are you saying to yourself? And where do you want to be? And like, is there a part of you that somewhere along the way just either had to be hidden for whatever reason or was just subtly lost over time? And when people can start to tap into that intuitive self, which I think happens gradually, so we also need to give a sense of like self-compassion to ourselves for that process to happen because there are many linear messages messages out there, right? That can it can be very distracting and disorienting. So people have it, right? And when they tap into it, they are able to very consistently like you go there. But when we don't, I think, ground it in something that feels innate to someone, then I think that there may just be points of potential performing, of like changing a behavior, but not knowing why they would want to change that behavior or not knowing what they desire. And I think I like to start there of not just what a goal is, not just what this outcome is, but like where what do you want it to feel? And like what part of you do you want to give voice to? And those are all the parts of you stuff.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, yeah, I I totally agree. And I think it's so aligned with why I also created this podcast, The Design Life, because it's not about designing a perfect life that looks really aesthetically wonderful. It's about designing a life that's that's yours and that starts trusting yourself. So I deeply align with that philosophy as well. I feel like there's so much in this conversation that women could, you know, dive into. And what I'd love to hear from you, like when we talk about the designed life, what does that mean to you in this season of your life? How are you intentionally designing your life as a mom, as a therapist, a business, like an entrepreneur? What does that look like for you in this season?
SPEAKER_00I think that I have defined and redefined my own values a multitude of times. And right now, I have grounded myself in creativity, adventuring, I think intellectual pursuits and really taking out everything, I would say my people. And I think that has been very freeing. And it may be that next year it looks very different. Last year is very different than this year, in that there were other things that I wanted to give my energy to. And I I learned a lot about myself throughout that process. And then this year was very much able to define who I would want to be and what boundaries I would want to set. And right now it is about balancing kind of like two parts of myself, career-wise, looking to see how I can support my children because they are in a different stage, which I've never negotiated. And also, like, how do I cultivate and nurture my caring community? And I think that that has been, if I look throughout my life, a major threat has been like people that I very much enjoy to all people listening to their own wisdom. And that's where I'm really grounding it. And it does allow to kind of set boundaries. And on top of everything else, you know, I do want to be also very, I think, transparent and human, and that I still also am managing guilt, right? Managing what motherhood and guilt looks like, managing what giving to my clients, you know, that might look like, how to look at my time in a way that is understanding like my own mopping point, but also not overextending myself. So I think that there's also that human piece. Yeah. Well, might hear, oh, share it all together. Yeah, I'm still learning and growing. Also being, I think, in that space of being willing to learn and grow, identify parts of myself that don't feel aligned, or I feel like there's just like a gap. Like I just might not know how to do that right now. How can I take steps to get and also have self-compassion?
SPEAKER_01That's beautiful. So much self-awareness and self-truth in there as well. I think I try to do the work of do I think I'd say you're doing all of those things. There is one thing you said a couple of times, one word you used a few times. And so I I sort of want to use that as a as our final question before we before I let you go today. If someone who is listening today could hear one one piece of permission from you today, one thing she's sort of been waiting for someone to tell her to do, just to explore, to allow herself to venture down this path or to explore this side of herself, what would that be? That's a question.
SPEAKER_00If I look at where things change, where I see change and transformation happen, my clients, it the weakest at that awareness of self. And that awareness of self is can I give myself permission to be curious versus in this constrained world? And curiosity, I think when we develop that, and that could be everything from what type of ice cream do I prefer, right? Giving, I think, an adult self permission to cultivate curiosity, creativity, and community and to do that under the umbrella of self-compassion and to say, like, let me take one or two steps in a direction to feel how that feels. I don't think we often give ourselves permission to be compassionate to ourselves and gentle to ourselves, and to at times radically reject some messaging around like a linear life. Because when you get down to it, if I were to map out every client I have the sticky point, has been the desire to stay within a linear. And then when you look at their life, I'm like, this is beautiful. Like you've lived a diverse life. We take that out and we don't want to be the constellation of every experience we've had as being valuable. But yet when we look up to the sky and we see a constellation, that's beautiful. Don't always do it for ourselves. And so to take that moment and say, I might want to be here, sure. But what are all the experiences that have allowed me to be in a place to even consider movement in a different direction? And say my life could be a constellation and it could be beautiful, and I could value those pieces because one star is beautiful. These lovely constellations in our sky. And so I may be in awe person. It's got beautiful.
SPEAKER_01Okay. Before we close off today, I want to say a huge thank you to you first. You've been so generous with your time, your energy, your wisdom, and knowledge, and your own personal depth of experience. So thank you. Can you share with us how listeners can find you, follow your work, or just learn more about you and read that beautiful poetry?
SPEAKER_00Sure. Home.ca is the website. So H O L M M. We have Instagram at home wellness. So H O L M M Wellness.
SPEAKER_01We will link everything in the show notes as well. And to everyone listening, if this conversation moves something in you today, I know it did for me. I would love for you to do one thing. Send it to one woman who needs to hear it. Maybe it's a friend, maybe a sister who's going through something, or a colleague who's confided in you that she's burnt out. Be the woman who says, I heard something today and I thought of you. Because when we do that, that's how we heal. We don't need to heal alone. We do it in community, in connection. And that's what this is all about. So thank you for joining us today.